


A Little Bit's Enough

by intentioncraft



Series: It's Gonna Be Better [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Dom Cain, Dom/sub, Food, Kink Negotiation, M/M, No Sex, Safeword Use, Sub Dean, references to past abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-07
Updated: 2014-12-07
Packaged: 2018-02-28 13:55:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2735054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/intentioncraft/pseuds/intentioncraft
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cain’s no amateur at this, but Dean is a ticking time bomb, a veritable snarl of bad habits, crossed wires, and invisible scars.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Little Bit's Enough

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted to [tumblr](http://intentioncrafts.tumblr.com/post/99843370908/dean-cain-some-kind-of-au-sub-dean-and-dom-cain).

Cain knows he’s playing with fire each and every time he strips Dean down to his barest and draws hidden things out of him like a surgeon, an archaeologist. But Dean can be explosively eager one moment then closed off and guarded the next. With pressure points mapped all over his body like a minefield, Cain takes care where and when he touches Dean even though Dean himself doesn’t consciously acknowledge his vulnerabilities most of the time. 

It’s not much of a guessing game because Cain’s no amateur at this, but Dean is a ticking time bomb, a veritable snarl of bad habits, crossed wires, and invisible scars.

He’s sitting naked on Cain’s kitchen table the first time he actually speaks up, shame pulling every bone in his body to the floor like a scolded dog just waiting to be put outside for the night. Cain composes his features and takes his left hand off Dean’s ankle and drops the leather restraint fastened to the sturdy table leg from his right.

Dean flinches when it hits the floor but trains his blindfolded eyes on some captivating nothing over Cain’s shoulder, waiting to be reprimanded.

Cain pushes the blindfold up Dean’s forehead. Tilts Dean’s chin to meet Cain’s eyes and draws his thumb over his bottom lip. Dean tries to hide the quivering of his hands by balling them up into fists in his lap.

“We need to talk. Put on your pants.”

Dean nods stiffly and does as he’s told.

—

Dean’s relaxed enough to stop the shaking of his hands twenty minutes later after finishing three slices of homemade chocolate chip banana bread, a glass of room temperature water, and a mug of tea. Cain brings from the kitchen a tray with the entire teapot, a small dish of fresh honey, a pile of papers stapled together in the corner and a pen. He puts all of it on the coffee table.

“What’s this for?” Dean looks down at the five-page typewritten list, a nearly solid line of checkmarks in blue ballpoint pen down the left hand margin and his name signed at the bottom next to Cain’s.

Cain seats himself across from Dean in the living room and picks up the teapot with both hands.

“Our agreement to your limits. We need to talk about it.”

Dean doesn’t move an inch toward the red pen Cain put next to the list, his lips shaking into a tight, brittle smile, “That’s not necessary.”

“I think it is. You safeworded before we could even begin,” Cain remarks dryly as he pours them both some more tea, “Even after I explained what we would be doing,”  he leaves enough room in Dean’s mug for the sickening amount of honey he likes in his, “That tells me that something is amiss in my understanding of your boundaries.”

“Nothing’s _amiss_ ,” Dean snarls, colour rising in his cheeks, but he does it while he’s stirring the honey into his drink, “I just — I forgot what I was supposed to be doing for a moment. It won’t happen again.”

“You’re right,” Cain takes a sip from his own mug, bitter and hot, “It won’t happen again, because you’re going to fill that out correctly and honestly so I won’t be able violate your limits again.”

Dean stops stirring, places his mug on the coffee table and puts both elbows on his knees, laces his fingers together and rests his clasped hands against his mouth. His eyes dart between the pages and the pen but he reaches for neither.

“You can take it home with you if you like,” Cain offers, “I’m not here for input. Just clarification.”

“I already told you, this isn’t necessary,” Dean says fiercely, “I’m not like that.”

Cain blinks and silently scrutinizes Dean but Dean doesn’t shrink back. He’s observed Dean’s curious body language closely enough over the past few weeks to know that this kind of bold determination is nothing more than a buffer to keep Dean from feeling too exposed. His jaw is set and pulsing with anger, but his wide, searching eyes betray him. Dean’s not new to the scene. He told Cain as much the first time he met him that he’s been doing “stuff like this” for almost ten years. Cain doesn’t make it his priority to learn about Dean’s history after only a few meet-ups, but there’s a mystery in Dean, a deep, poisonous hurt in him and it’s all connected, Cain’s certain of it, to how he presents himself to Cain now. He knew it from the moment he put the list of activities in front of Dean the first time around and Dean approached the routine with hesitation and confusion. He’d claimed to have done many things for his past doms, but it was evident that filling out a detailed contract like this was not one of them.

“Fill it out again,” Cain says, calm as possible. Dean’s stubborn but Cain can be a brick wall. 

“How many times do I have t—”

“Do it, Dean. Or consider this arrangement over. I will not go forward with a submissive who refuses to state his limits. I don’t get off on traumatizing the people I care about,” Cain doesn’t mean for it to come out angrily, but it slips through the cracks. He’d be sad to lose Dean. He’s become invested in him as more than a sub in such a small window of time. Dean’s performance has been phenomenal, certainly, but the younger man provides a warmth in Cain’s life that he hasn’t experienced in years. Things around his old house feel more alive, Cain himself feels the weight of everything lifting from his shoulders whenever Dean is around, filling the small moments between the formalities of their arrangement and the sex itself with gentle jokes and easy conversation.

Cain has never been a big believer in  _auras_ , for Christ’s sake, but Dean fills any space he steps into with a golden sort of gravity, a low musical hum that comforts and endures even after he gathers his things and leaves in the morning to go to work.

Cain isn’t sure what he brings to Dean’s life, whether it’s just the sex and the baking or if he actually means more to him than however many time he can thrill Dean in a night. But he won’t forsake Dean’s comfort and safety just for the chance to be with him.

“Just fill it out again and come back, huh?” Dean breaks the stand-off first. He picks up the list like it’s a used tissue and flips through it distastefully, “And then we can, uh, get back to work?”

“It’s play, not work,” Cain says, “The difference between this and work is you do it because you want to, not because you have to and not because somebody tells you that you have to,” Dean’s frown makes a come-back but he doesn’t argue with Cain this time, “Fill it out with yourself in mind this time and don’t think about me.”

—

Dean comes back more than a week later, late in the evening, unannounced and drenched from the rain on his run from his big black car in the driveway to Cain’s front door. The sheets of paper are crumpled and soaked in his hand but Cain can see the red ink and snags a closer look when Dean shoves it into his hand. Cain’s heart sinks when he sees just how many red markings there are. It’s a mess, but it’s just as he asked it to be: honest.

He can sense Dean trying to angle his body away from him. His behaviours are starting to make frightening sense. With just a cursory glance, Cain knows there’s no way Dean has been totally comfortable with everything they’ve done up to this point. The other day was just the first time it became too much and Cain came right up against one of his hard limits, and the guilt that’s been churning in his gut like his insides have turned to mud for a week feels like it’s solidified, a massive boulder weighing him down.

“I wasn’t sure about some things so I just circled them.”

Cain forces himself to stay as cool as possible and finds what he’s looking for specifically at the moment, the second page, just so he can provide some kind of feedback for Dean, “Ankles are a definite no for binding. Wrists are a yes?” Cain remarks tightly. His voice barely makes it over the sound of rain.

“Yeah,” Dean chokes out, “Feels like. I dunno. Can’t run away,” he blushes, “I know that doesn’t make any sense. Sorry.”

“You don’t have to explain,” Cain says, “Or apologize,” He looks up from Dean’s list and tucks it under his arm. It’s hard to smile.

“Right,” Dean says.

“Would you like to come inside?” Dean startles at that. He clearly wasn’t expecting to get invited in, assumed Cain wouldn’t want to have him around any more. He did what Cain asked him to do properly this time while expecting it to end their relationship. But he came here anyway.

Dean came here with the understanding that his list would irreparably sabotage their relationship.

Either that, or he took a leap of faith. Cain doubts it, however.

“Thank you for doing this,” Cain waves the papers at Dean once before slapping them down on the counter, harder than necessary. Dean’s fidgeting with the hem of his shirt in the entrance to Cain’s kitchen. The smell of fresh honey cake is so thick inside the room with all the windows closed to the downpour outside, it’s almost difficult to breathe.

“You’re not, uh, pissed off at me?” Dean is tall and broad and beautiful, but he looks tiny and ruined in Cain’s kitchen. The sleeves of his jacket drip on the floor.

“I am pissed off, but not at you,” Cain says. He washes his hands roughly and then tosses a few pieces of honey cake onto a plate, “I’m mad at whoever taught you that your limits are not worth mentioning. Take these,” Cain shoves the stacked plate at Dean. Dean doesn’t comment on that, but complies and takes a seat at the table without being asked and picks up a piece of cake. Cain notes the initiative and starts to clean up the mess he made from baking. They’re quiet for awhile as Dean eats and Cain tidies up.

When Cain finally puts the last measuring cup washed and dried back in the cupboard, he sits down at the table with Dean and takes one of the pieces of cake from the plate. Of course, Dean chooses the moment when Cain’s mouth is full to say, “Most people just don’t want a sub who doesn’t shut up about his weaknesses. Guess you’re just not what I’m used to,” he adds sheepishly.

Cain puts the rest of the cake down and swallows much faster than feels comfortable, but “Those people haven’t earned the right to ask you to do anything for them,” he barks, almost asks Dean what his former dom’s name was, but he can tell by the heat rising all over his body that it’s rage trying to control his actions. Knowing the name of this person will change nothing about what Dean’s been through. The only thing he can do is support Dean now, “Having boundaries does not make you weak.”

Dean makes a skeptical, dismissive noise. Rome wasn’t built in a day. Cain doesn’t expect this to be easy. He looks at the clock. It’s almost eleven. It’s Monday tomorrow so they both have to go to work. Dean can usually run on only a few hours of sleep but Cain can’t, and frankly Cain thinks Dean could use more eight-hour nights in his life.

“It’s late. Don’t think this discussion is over,” he points warningly at Dean, “But you’re welcome to stay the night.”

Dean raises his eyebrows, “You’re serious about this?” it wasn’t a leap of faith coming here, but Cain can see that Dean’s starting to understand that it paid off like one anyway.

“No sex,” Cain adds, “Sleep in my bed and I’ll join you if you want, but hands and mouths stay above the belt.”

“Yes, sir,” Dean grins in spite of himself, and it pushes out some of the grim fury out of Cain’s chest, and he’s finally able to smile warmly in return.  

 


End file.
